Local officials play a leading role in running our nation’s elections. Generally, they are trusted because they understand their communities and how best to serve their constituents. However, bad-faith actors and conspiracy theorists are increasingly spreading dangerous myths about election clerks and how elections are conducted. This has made doing their jobs harder and more dangerous.
As a former election official who has worked in Georgia, Texas, and Washington, D.C., I’m here to set the record straight on several misconceptions that are damaging our democracy.
Myth: Certifying the election results is optional.
Fact: Certification is required by law.
Confirming the election results, also known as certification, is a routine, administrative step that takes place at the end of the vote-counting process. This is when election board members vote to submit the results to the Secretary of State. This step, mandated in all 50 states and territories, ensures the math is correct. It’s not an investigation into the election’s integrity, nor is it a choice.
Before certification, election officials have already taken a series of mandatory steps to ensure votes are accurately counted and issues or questions about irregularities have been resolved. Making sure elections are fair is already baked into the process.
In recent years, some election board members have refused to certify election results. This tactic, performed under the guise of “ensuring election integrity,” is actually intended to sow distrust among the public. Certification refusals delay election outcomes in an already tight timeline and disrupt a system that has been proven effective for decades. Additionally, these challenges don’t succeed—they consistently fail in court and those who brought them have faced criminal prosecution.
Myth: Our election processes aren’t secure.
Fact: Safeguards against election fraud and interference are in place—and they work.
Every state has strict laws and security protocols to protect elections. After each election cycle, officials review and upgrade these protocols and implement new laws passed by their state legislature. Since 2020, 92% of election officials have taken important steps to increase election security and firm up infrastructure.
Local election officials test voting equipment before election day, update the electors list, and prepare public reports on election results. On election night, officials have chain-of-custody procedures for all ballots in place, ensure security protocols are carried out in polling places, and verify that all eligible ballots cast are counted. Keeping elections secure is a fundamental part of their job.
Mail-in ballots and drop boxes, tools that increase voting access and make it easier for citizens to participate in elections, have unfortunately faced unsubstantiated attacks. Thorough investigations consistently find them secure and reliable.
Myth: Frivolous challenges have no cost.
Fact: Challenges and threats by bad-faith actors deplete local resources and can lead to exorbitant taxpayer costs.
Frivolous legal challenges and serial open-record requests by bad actors drain resources, diverting time and energy from essential election tasks.
During my time as an election official, we routinely received five to 10 open records requests daily, which resulted in us having to respond to hundreds in the lead-up to elections.
While officials pride themselves on transparency and welcome legitimate open record requests, weaponizing these requests distracts from the real work of running elections—and taxpayers ultimately bear the cost.
Myth: People are committing widespread voter fraud.
Fact: People aren’t voting in multiple places, registering where they don’t live, or casting ballots illegally as noncitizens.
Despite the widespread myth, studies and research by the Brennan Center and other reputable non-partisan and bipartisan organizations show that actual voter fraud is exceedingly rare and almost impossible to achieve.
Claims that people are voting illegally or casting multiple ballots simply don’t hold up. In my experience as an election official, I never saw noncitizens attempting to vote, and when mistakes in registration occurred, they were unintentional.
Additionally, there are multiple checks in place to ensure voters are U.S. citizens. States confirm voter identities using information from the federal Social Security Administration as well as the state Department of Motor Vehicles. Allegations of widespread mail-in ballot fraud are also exaggerated. Jurisdictions follow strict processes to validate and count mail-in ballots, ensuring only eligible votes are included. (If anything, the true flaw in our system is that far too many votes are disqualified for trivial reasons.)
Myth: Administrative errors are a sign of fraud.
Fact: Errors are rare and accidental—and there are processes to identify and correct them.
Despite their best efforts, election administrators will encounter administrative challenges because elections are large-scale, human-run operations staffed by people who often only participate a few days out of the year. Accordingly, there are procedures in place to catch and correct potential administrative errors before results are certified, including reviewing and double-checking candidate information, ballot preparation, ballot tabulation, and election night reporting.
Despite challenges to election results based on administrative errors since the 2022 elections, very few election results have been overturned—and not because of fraud.
Myths about fraud and abuse may grab headlines but don’t represent reality. Our electoral system is among the safest and most secure in the world. This has been made possible thanks to a strong, durable, and transparent system filled with safeguards and processes dutifully followed by thousands of election administrators who work day in and day out to ensure every vote is counted fairly. As Election Day draws near, it’s critical that we put faith in our election officials and the system—and ignore the noise and frivolous accusations.
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